Following up last month’s story on the first new Miyazaki drawn manga in several years, I’ve managed to track down some more details and a couple of images (click for larger versions). The first part of Kaze Tachinu (風立ちぬ, The Wind Rises) was published last week in Japanese hobby magazine Model Graphix, and is based on the life of Zero fighter designer Horikoshi Jiro, and is not – as some websites will try and tell you – a ‘glorification of WW2 kamikaze pilots’.

What’s particularly interesting is that he has decided to illustrate all the manga’s characters as anthropomorphic pigs – the contrast between the character designs and the mechanically detailed aircraft instantly reminiscent of his 1992 classic Porco Rosso. Also, the story starts with Jiro as a young man, meeting with legendary Italian aircraft engineer Giovanni Caproni, designer of the Caproni Ca 309 Ghibli – which is obviously the origin of the studio’s name. Check out some more details over at Ghibli World.

Obviously, I’m going to try and track down a copy of this charming looking manga, and I will of course let you know how I get on.

3 Comments

For one, I don’t think any glorification of fighter planes would have a washing line with the pilot’s pants and socks attached to it. To my inexpert eye, the first image made me think a little of Richard Scarry books.

2tim wrote:

Haha – yes, I can totally see the Richard Scarry comparison.

I should point out – that image isn’t from the new Manga; it’s an image Miyazaki painted of the Caproni Ca 309 Ghibli plane that the studio took it’s name from. If you look in the back you can see it’s full of little animators, beavering (pigging?) away.

And if you haven’t seen Porco Rosso yet I can HUGELY recommend it – his designs of customised, lived in aircraft combined with a subtle anti-fascist sub text make it one of my favourite of Miyazaki-san’s films.